1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates in general to electronic watch modules and, more particularly, to an improved watch module assembly having a chassis for mounting a substrate and wherein the chassis and substrate cooperate to integrally form a chamber for hermetically sealing an associated crystal element.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Electronic watches of various configurations are well-known in the prior art and in fact have proliferated extensively in recent years. In comparison with their prior mechanical counter parts, electronic watches have usually exhibited a higher profile (height) and attempts have been made to style the watch cases so as to minimize this somewhat undesirable characteristic. Current electronic watch modules generally employ a substrate which is either a ceramic wafer or a printed circuit board containing associated electronic circuitry, which is often secured to a frame member with screws or other fasteners. The frame member supports other watch components as well, such as a visual display of some sort and one or more batteries in, more often than not, in a somewhat awkward, space consuming configurations. The resultant product has a thick, bulky appearance.
In addition, a piezoelectric watch crystal element is usually mounted and sealed in a discrete enclosure, such as a metal can which requires both the crystal before packaging, and the oscillator circuit after assembly, to be trimmed to a predetermined frequency, often times requiring an external variable trimmer capacitor element of relatively large bulk. Current crystal element packages require two leads to extend out of the package and be connected to the oscillator circuitry, requiring a larger overall package size.